High Places
by zetsuboushita27
Summary: A contractor is murdered by a ghoul with mysterious links to the Syndicate, and Hei and team are tasked with finding the creature. However, Hei is beginning to question his loyalties, and himself; more than ever, in fact, he is drawn to high places. After encountering a troubled boy on an abandoned rooftop, and facing Misaki's growing suspicion, Tokyo seems increasingly mysterious.
1. encounter

I

 _ **Prologue**_

 _October 6_

"What _are_ you?"

The contractor blinked in repulsion as the man she'd been sent to kill… well, she wasn't quite sure what was happening to him. She'd worked for various crime syndicates for years, taking the lives of all sorts of contractors with all sorts of deadly abilities, and yet she couldn't remember ever seeing anything even remotely similar to this _creature._ Silhouetted in the dry, limp moonlight, it was difficult to make out the writhing masses erupting from her target's back; she clicked her fingers and a small quivering flame appeared in the palm of her leather-gloved hand, creating distorted shadows across the grimy walls of the tenebrous alleyway in which the confrontation was taking place. The orange light flickered and jumped, and the grotesquely dancing shadows mocked the thrashing of her target's ungodly tentacle-like appendage; the contractor shaped the flame and thrust it in the direction of the creature.

Streaking brilliantly through the air, it found its target with ease, and the man's face was engulfed in white hot fire near instantly.

Instinctively the contractor took her left hand in her right, wrenching back the index finger until it was almost touching her wrist, and cracking it painfully; her Obeisance was a painful one, but the pain was something she had grown used to by now- in fact it often helped her clear her head.

The cries of the creature in front of her had dwindled and morphed seamlessly into silence in the second or so it had taken the contractor to perform her remuneration; she glanced in his direction, expecting to find him on the ground, engulfed in flame and convulsing violently.

Instead she found herself quite gruesomely impaled on the twitching, blood-drenched organ.

The ghoul retracted his kagune and the contractor let out a piercing cry as she stared down at her own shredded torso, the wavering flame dying in her paling, trembling hand, blood mixing with meaty chunks of flesh and innards beginning to surge from the open wound in her mid-section as she sank gracelessly to the cold concrete ground. By the time she lost consciousness, more blood was spilled on the damp alley floor than was inside her; by the time the ghoul took its first bite from her well-shaped thigh, she was already dead.

He peeled off her layers of combat clothing (all the while his own skin slowly stitching itself together cell by cell, his raw, melted flesh molding itself back into shape) and inhaled deeply, noting with some interest that there was a peculiar scent surrounding her: she certainly didn't smell like a ghoul, but she didn't seem entirely human either. Her sweet, sweet flesh, lean and sapid, had a fraught, twisted taste to it; he took his time on her, savouring her exotic flavor with a warped jouissance.

As the ghoul, by then drenched in thick hot blood and intensely satisfied with his meal, abandoned the unrecognizably mutilated remnants of his victim in the dimly lit alleyway, he took a moment to look up at the vast canvas of stars sprawling out in all directions above him, at the rippling noir of the infinite sky enveloping this dark, depraved Tokyo night. He failed to notice, however, the faintly blinking star just to the north-east of him as it sputtered and spasmed; moreover, he failed to notice as it fell and faded into nothingness.

" _ **Sometimes human places, create inhuman monsters."**_ _\- Stephen King_

II

 _October 8_

The four of them met in the same place they always did.

"Are you sure you're ready, Hei?"  
Mao would've smirked, had it not been for his physiological limitations. He hopped blithely onto the bench and settle beside Huang, curling his tail neatly round his paws.

"Concerned, are we?"

"Yes, _actually,_ " Huang replied gruffly, scowling. "If Hei messes this one up, we'll all be dead. Or worse."

"I'm fine," Hei muttered, frowning slightly more than usual. If he hated one thing, it was people thinking he was weak. The truth was, he'd been torn up pretty bad on their last assignment, and had required a couple of weeks to lay low; better to rest up, he was advised, than to put his team and their missions in jeopardy. He hadn't thought it necessary, but, come to think of it, a break from the constant pressures of Syndicate undertakings had been refreshing, however brief.

"Good. Now, can we get on with it?" The resulting silence indicated to Huang that yes, they could get on with it. "Two nights ago, a contractor was killed in an alley on Syndicate business." He paused almost imperceptibly, shifting his gaze. "They tell me she was… eaten."

Hei blinked. "Eaten?"

"As far as anyone can tell, yes. She was, ahem, _eaten_ by what we think was her target: a suspected Syndicate defector."

"Let me guess, it's our mission to find him and _not_ get eaten, right?" Mao asked, jumping down from the bench and landing lightly on all fours.

"We don't know very much about him- everything the last contractor managed to find out was lost with her, obviously- _but_ ," Huang continued, ignoring Mao's question with a glare, "we do know that he works at a bar in the 14th ward, and that he possesses documents that, for whatever reason, the Syndicate don't want him to have."

"Can we get Yin to watch him for a while?" Hei asked. At the mention of her name, Yin, who was sat on the other side of the bench staring contentedly into nothing, raised her head ever so slightly.

"Sure, she'll be able to track him- it's a bar, there'll be tons of water around. No, it's not finding him we should be worried about." Huang stood up and began to move away, expertly dropping a white envelope beside Hei as he did so; Hei discreetly slipped it into his jacket pocket, not pausing to glance at it. "It's the fact that he's some kind of monster," he uttered to himself gloomily as he left.

Mao coiled round Hei's ankles sullenly. "Don't you just love this job?"

That night, Hei was struck with an intense sense of restlessness.

III

He considered shrugging on his coat, slipping on his mask and stealing out into the cold October night in search of trouble. However, he thought better of it, instead deciding to go on a simple walk through the night, as he'd done many times during his short break from his dangerous work.

The city was hardly empty, but honestly, he liked the bright lights and bustling crowds (not that he'd ever let such a thing on to anyone but himself). His instincts were still as sharp as ever, and he couldn't help but glance around every corner and peer into every shadow, as if expecting there to be a threat lingering at every turn. As ironic as it seemed, nevertheless, the Black Reaper really did enjoy the feeling of blending in with city's endless mundane chaos.

He wandered aimlessly about the artificially lit streets, occasionally glancing up at the equally artificial stars. Briefly he remembered the real stars, and all the painful memories associated with them- memories that, for the time being, he'd much rather repress.

He quite suddenly got the urge to be up high.

There was, in his mind, safety in high places; and anyway, it was kind of his _thing_. Not particularly far away was an old hotel, he knew, with the sad remains of a rooftop lounging area, and before he could quite come up with a good reason why, he found himself heading towards it with a real sense of urgency.

The door onto the rooftop was rusted metal; it swung open with an unsatisfying _clunk_. Although his facial expressions remained characteristically impassive, Hei's breath caught ever so slightly in his throat as he surveyed the view from the top of the building. There was nothing he couldn't see.

The cold air stung his face, and the expanse of buildings and lights before him was incomprehensible; his attention, however, was soon diverted.

A small lone figure was sat at the very edge of the building, seemingly muttering to themself, though the words were whipped away by the wind. The person- he couldn't tell their gender- seemed childlike to Hei, and for a moment he was _almost_ concerned; curiosity was his prevalent reaction, though, and he slowly crept towards them. He was well accustomed to moving in complete silence.

Obviously he wasn't quite silent enough.

"Who are you?" The young boy- for Hei had come to the conclusion that they were a boy, though he really wasn't certain- stood up straight on the narrow ledge and spun around quickly, smiling sweetly with an almost maniacal glint in his eyes.

Hei was momentarily thrown by his appearance: he was tiny, with long white hair and deathly pale skin punctuated with red… stitches?

"My name is Li Shengshun," Hei replied softly, unsure of how to react.

"I'm Juuzou Suzuya," the odd-looking boy announced proudly, tilting his head a little. The encounter was beginning to make Hei a little uncomfortable; he found himself on edge, though he couldn't quite explain why.

The sound of someone clattering up the stairs to the roof made Hei jump to attention quite suddenly.

"Juuzou, there you are," a large man in a suit exclaimed breathlessly from the top of the stairwell. "I've been looking all over for you!" His attention turned quickly to Hei, and he frowned slightly. "Who are you?"

"My name is Li Shengshun," Hei repeated, trying to think of a less _whimsical_ reason for his presence on the rooftop. "I was just… looking for… someone up here." He beamed, giving the stranger his best awkward Li smile.

He received nothing but a suspicious look in response, before the man turned his focus away again.

"Come on, Juuzou. We've got business to attend to, and I wouldn't be surprised if the rest of them are already annoyed that we're late."

"Where are we going, Mr Shinohara?" Juuzou Suzuya asked in a sing-song voice, jumping down from the ledge lightly.

"I'll explain in the car."

As the pair left, the boy, Juuzou, turned around and gave Hei another garish smile, and Hei noticed that his eyes were the strangest shade of red.


	2. just a ghoul

**A/N: Yes, I know Itori isn't canonically the bartender at the Helter Skelter, but for the sake of convenience can we just imagine she is? She's not really a part of this story anyway. Oh yeah, and I promise there will be more Juuzou in chapter 3. Anyway, to the 9 of you who will read this, I hope you enjoy, and** _ **please**_ **leave a review! :v**

I

Section Chief Misaki Kirihara tried to keep her breathing steady as she aggressively avoided eye contact with any of the Helter Skelter's patrons. The bar wasn't the most reputable of places, of this much Misaki had already been aware, but it was still something of a shock to her as she observed the occasional shady character mooching into the establishment from the wall against which she was leant, she hoped, rather casually.

She felt uncomfortably exposed. Out in the open with nothing visible to distinguish her as a member of authority, anything could happen. Misaki swallowed any fear that threatened to rise in her throat, however; this _was_ , after all, her job.

"Yeah, I'll see you later." The door just to her right swung open, and instantly she could feel the warmth on her face, could hear the hushed chatter and occasional shout from inside, could smell the distinctive smell of stale beer and stronger, more potent alcoholic concoctions.

Misaki took a deep breath. The man leaving the Helter Skelter bar was, she knew, the man she was after- a man named Hiromasa Aihara, born in Tokyo, thirty-two years old, suspected of involvements of indeterminate nature with the notoriously shadowy Syndicate, possibly a contractor, definitely dangerous.

"Excuse me, sir." Misaki smiled briefly at the man in what she hoped was a convincingly anxious manner. "I'm really sorry, but do you know where this is?" she asked, showing him a small piece of paper with an address on it.

"Yeah, uh, that's actually on the way back to my place. I could show you the way, if you want?" he offered, exactly as Misaki had intended.

"That would be great! I mean, if you're sure it's no trouble."

"Of course not."

She didn't like the way he was looking at her.

Black rain glanced off of the road. Lights like cigarette burns in the dark blistered across the entirety of the city; cars writhed around hotly, never seeming to stop.

The air was thin, almost unbreathable, as Hei stole his way through the night. He was unfamiliar with the 14th ward- moreover, he was unfamiliar with its alleyways and side streets- but he had in his mind the general image of the layout he'd laboriously studied earlier. There was no way the Black Reaper was carrying around a map.

The streets were empty, almost unnervingly so. Hei had caught sight of hardly a single person so far; there was the eerie sense, however, that he wasn't actually alone. Buildings on either side of him loomed, and it felt as if people were hiding silently in their shadows, urgent whispers fading before they could be heard.

His objective _had_ been to observe the target, to follow him, to find out more about him: where he lived, if he stopped to speak to anyone on his way home, that sort of thing. Yin had been sat at the tobacco shop with her feet dipped in a bowl of water all day watching the man's activities as he'd been working, and had confirmed that he had the memory stick containing the Syndicate documents on him; obviously he must've been concerned about leaving it at home unsupervised, for fear of it being stolen.

It became clear to Hei, however, that he'd have to pursue another course of action.

 _Misaki Kirihara._ Section Chief of Foreign Affairs Section Four.

" _Damn it,"_ he hissed to himself as he ducked back around the corner he'd just come from, blending back into the shadows before he could be recognized.

He had no choice but to follow them.

Chief Kirihara investigating the same man Hei was after suddenly made things all too sticky, but he had navigated sticky situations involving Misaki before- he wasn't too concerned about her finding out his true identity. He was, however, concerned about the very real possibility of Section Four getting their hands on whatever that classified Syndicate information happened to be; it was for this reason that he set about shadowing them at a distance.

As Hei watched them he wondered what Kirihara was planning to do, trying to come up with plausible scenarios, and the resulting actions he would take regarding each one. He knew that there was a chance that he wasn't the only one observing the pair, and that he was potentially in a very difficult situation.

It seemed to Misaki that, somehow, the roads were getting narrower the further they walked. After every corner they turned around, everything would seem a little closer, a little darker, a little more unsettling. She also had the uncomfortable sensation that she was being watched. Well, she was- Saitou and co. hopefully weren't far off, keeping track of everything that was going on as best they could- but that didn't help to ease the nervous chills beginning to creep up her spine.

"So, you looking for someone at that address or what?" the suspect, Aihara, asked casually as they walked. His hand ever so slightly brushed against hers; Misaki began to feel mildly nauseous.

"Just visiting a friend," she replied lightly, sweat beading on her forehead. "She recently moved, and I wasn't sure how to get to the new address."

"Oh. You close, or…?"

"Yes," she lied quickly, "I know her pretty well."

Aihara smiled sickeningly. "Well, that's a shame."

Misaki's blood ran cold. "Th-that's a _shame_?" she echoed, her voice faltering just a little. "Yeah, it's a shame," he replied apathetically, steering her off into some narrow street, cast in shadow and lined with tall, uniform buildings. "It's a damn shame that you're not going to be able to see your little friend now." He grinned widely.

" _Did you just threaten me_?" she began to ask coldly. She was cut off, however, at the sight of the inhuman tentacles that began to writhe from the man's back.

 _What is he?_ Misaki thought to herself, too stricken with horror to move. Before she could act, before she could even think, one of the appendages had snaked its way around her forearm, another round her waist, and she screamed.

The man's face was cast dramatically in shadow, but his gruesome silhouette was clear to Hei from his position a few paces behind. What he was seeing was no mistake. The detached part of Hei's personality absently wondered of this was some kind of contractor he'd never seen before; there was another part of him, though, that was screaming at him to get to Kirihara, to save her before this _monster_ could kill her.

Though it pained him somewhat, Hei kept himself from acting impulsively. He lingered in the darkness, hidden, watching silently.

Misaki's throat was raw, and she was panicking. Desperately she attempted to take control of her thoughts, to take control of her body, paralyzed with fear and restrained though it was.

Aihara pulled her towards him and inhaled deeply, his eyelids fluttering and his stomach-churning smile twisting menacingly as he took in her scent.

"There, now," he hissed. "Don't scream. It'll all be over in just a minute."

As she struggled to coordinate her body, Misaki wondered what about that statement was meant to encourage her not to scream. Aihara leaned into her neck, and, to her absolute horror, slowly licked her from her collarbone to her jawline. She screamed again, thrashing against the choking grip of the meaty red tendrils that had now began to wrap around her neck, restricting her breathing, crushing her windpipe.

Aihara leant into her once more.

And took a bite clean out of her shoulder.

The pain seared through her entire body. Her scream was silent; she struggled to breathe as the blood surged from the bite. A rush of adrenaline wracked her entire form, and she struggled relentlessly against his hold; another bite, however, this one from further up her neck, and she slackened against him, drained.

Hei tensed up, unable to comprehend what exactly he was seeing. He was about to intervene- running headfirst into dangerous situations was, of course, his specialty- when someone else appeared to beat him to it.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" growled a voice from behind the ghoul. Aihara spun round to face whoever it was, dropping Misaki heavily to the ground as he did so. As she hit the floor with a hideous thud, she tried to reach for her phone to contact Saitou, but found her limbs were unresponsive- she was all but dead weight.

"This is my feeding ground," she heard the man snarl; from where she was sprawled on the ground, she couldn't see what was going on, but she could hear every last crunch as the two began to fight.

The intruder thrust Aihara up against a nearby wall by the throat, tightening his grip as the other ghoul began to choke on his own blood. Before Aihara could even fight back, he was viciously speared on the interrupters kagune, his entire torso rupturing forcefully outwards in a viscid crimson soup; he slumped to the ground, spent, and his killer spat viciously on his corpse.

The ghoul turned slowly to Misaki. "I'm not going to kill you." Somehow he made it sound like an insult. "I'd rather die than finish that sack of shit's leftovers."

Misaki could barely comprehend what she was hearing; looming unconsciousness was washing over her in waves at that point. Just as she was on the verge of blacking out completely, she heard someone walking towards her. She lifted her head- which seemed to weigh a ton- as much as she could; when she recognized the figure standing over her, she gasped.

 _BK-201._

Then, nothing.

Hei skulked towards Kirihara carefully. He had no idea what he'd just seen (or heard; _feeding ground?)_ , but he- for whatever reason- couldn't let her die.

He lifted her mobile phone from her trouser pocket delicately, touching as little of her inert body as he could, and took a picture of the scene before him- Kirihara's near lifeless form, and the layout of the alley they were in (including the very clear sign just to the right of her that readstated the name of the road) - and sent it to the first number in her emergency contacts: Saitou.

As he quietly departed from the scene, he tried not to feel guilty; he had faith that Misaki Kirihara's most trusted subordinate would find her in time. He took off running across a nearby rooftop, all the while taking care not to glance behind him.

II

"Just the regular please, love," a short, muscular man with greasy hair that seemed almost red in the bar's asphyxiatingly warm light said, catching the attention of the scantily-clad female bartender.

The man leaned in towards her, nodding his head towards Hei, who had been idly polishing the inside of a glass with a grubby white cloth a few feet away. "Who's the new kid?" the man asked, raising his eyebrows in Hei's direction.

Hei- Li- pretended not to listen as he placed his glass down gently on the side. Considering it was only his second day working there, a _lot_ of people had asked about him, and everyone- bar staff included- had been treating him oddly the entire time: either they avoided him entirely, faces twisted in mix of confusion and what could only be called disgust, or they hovered incessantly around him, asking after him constantly, but never directly _to_ him, never to his face.

Naturally, Hei had, at first, been under the impression that they all somehow knew that he was a Contractor, but surely that couldn't be it. That would've been impossible. Just a fraction of Tokyo's population knew of the existence of Contractors, and most of those were government officials; there was no way all of them just happened to frequent the very bar Hei worked part-time at.

Of course, the only reason he'd began working there was because his previous target had been viciously murdered, meaning Hei had no idea where the Syndicate documents were. The best course of action had been to figure out who the defector had given the memory stick to, since as far as any of Hei's team could tell, he had to have given it to somebody at his workplace. Since, however, all of the staff had been avoiding him quite pointedly, this was more difficult than Hei had expected it to be.

"Oh, just some kid we took on yesterday. An exchange student, apparently," the glittery-eyed, orange-haired bartender replied with a quirk of the lips.

"An _exchange student_ , eh?" The man leant in even further. "So why'd you hire him, Itori? What's really going on?"

Itori smiled furtively. "He came here asking for work. How could I refuse?" 

Hei frowned. His suspicions were growing into something similar, perhaps, on a conceptual level at least, to fear. Trying his best to avoid eye contact with the people discussing him, he glanced through the door to the __'staff only' area, and…

 _Shit. There it is._

Hei made an almost unnoticeable noise as he registered the memory stick just lying there next to one of the bar staff's coats. He didn't know whose coat it was, and at this point he didn't particularly care; he just wanted to get his hands on the thing and get out of there before he had to deal with anybody else enquire after his circumstances without acknowledging his presence.

Hei busied himself with another glass as the bartender turned around to pour the man's drink.

Later that evening, Hei was approached by the owner of the coat; he only knew the man who approached him was the owner of the coat because, with no small amount of suspicion, Hei had agreed to accompany the man outside into the dim, stifling night for a 'quick word', and had witnessed the man shrugging on the coat in a somewhat paranoid manner. Hei had also taken care to notice that the man had, after a quick glance to both his left and right, slipped the memory stick into his inside jacket pocket. Clearly this was the only reason he'd worn the coat (to keep this most coveted of contraband close), since it was strangely hot outside for that time of day, and, moreover, for that time of year; it was October, and yet the air itself seemed to be dripping with heat, the kind of moist evening heat that only seems to follow the coldest of days.

"You knew him, didn't you?"

Hei looked at the man coldly. "Who?"

The man shook his head. "You know who. He goes and gets himself murdered and a couple days later some stranger, some _outsider_ , turns up sniffing round his corpse- an immigrant, no less- and y…"

"Exchange student," Hei muttered, his gaze getting colder by a few degrees.

"What?" The man stared. "Look, I know what your deal is. I know about you. Which is more than you can say," he continued, ignoring Hei's interjection, "about us."

Now it was Hei's turn to stare. "Who are you?"  
The man carried on, ignoring Hei once again. "You're just after _this_ , aren't you?" he accused, producing the memory stick from his pocket.

" _Who are you?"_ Hei repeated. He was on edge; his absolute lack of control over this conversation was making him uncomfortable, but he continued to stare the other man down solidly.

It was silent for a few long seconds, and tension began to ferment in the empty space left by the lack of words.

Then, from back inside the bar, a jeer went up- something to do with sports, no doubt- and the moment fractured. The other man seemed to drop his guard almost imperceptibly, and his eyes, cast into light shadow by a brow lightly dusted with droplets of nervous perspiration, fell to the concrete at Hei's feet.

"Look, just take it," he said, thrusting it at Hei. "B-but don't give it to them. I can tell... that you don't want to, that you don't trust them. You shouldn't, anyway."

Hei, having caught the item in one hand without tearing his eyes away from the other man for even a fraction of a second, inspected it, before putting into his pocket and looking back at the man through his eyelashes.

"Who are you?" he asked again, quietly this time, like the question held a new meaning somehow.

"Me? I'm just a ghoul."


	3. doves?

I

A small brownish bird about the size of a child's fist dipped and twisted through the clear afternoon sky, its toy-like wings beating frantically as it flitted about. Juuzou Suzuya stared at it through the window. Tugging absently at the stitches encircling his slender white fingers, he watched the bird, wondering impassively what it might look like with its frenetic little wings torn off. He imagined in laborious detail its tiny red heart, all of its microscopic little insides, delicate and so very breakable. Eventually, however, the bird flickered out of sight, and Juuzou sighed.

This meeting had been going on for at least an hour.

Wondering if he could get away with a light nap, he folded his arms on the table and rested his head on them, humming to himself ever so quietly as the senior investigator at the front droned on and on and _on_. He stayed like this for all of two minutes, before-

"Suzuya!" somebody barked from across the table. "Pay attention!"

Lifting his head with a sour glare, Juuzou glanced at Shinohara, who raised an eyebrow at him.

The investigator who had been speaking started slightly at the interruption, before clearing his throat and continuing in the same monotonous tone.

…

Sat cross-legged like a child in the passenger seat beside Shinohara, Juuzou was uncharacteristically somber as the car headed away from the CCG building. The meeting had lasted a further hour and a half beyond the minor disturbance, taking them up to about dinnertime, and Shinohara was _starving_ ; he'd offered to take Juuzou out somewhere to eat, and, with characteristic exuberance, Juuzou had agreed. Now, however, the boy was staring silently out of the window, wide-eyed and thoughtful.

"What are you thinking about?" Shinohara asked gently, glancing over at him.

After almost a full minute, Juuzou replied quietly: "Li Shengshun."

Taken slightly by surprise, Shinohara had to rack his brains to remember the name, familiarity tugging at him uncomfortably. "From that hotel rooftop? What were you doing up there anyway?" he asked, shifting in his seat a little.

Of course, he knew the answer already- he knew that Juuzou was often drawn to high places, that whenever he felt tense or restless something in his twisted little mind beckoned him to rooftops and similar heights. Shinohara had no idea why; as hard as he'd tried, he couldn't even begin to fully understand the boy, with all of his quirks and all his problems. He'd grown fonder of him over time, however, and had started to feel protective of him. Just the thought of Juuzou's upbringing, the childhood stolen from him, the torture he'd endured- it sickened him to his core.

"So who was that man, anyway? What did he say to you?" Shinohara prompted further, trying to ease a reply out of his passenger.

Juuzou's lips twitched into something like a smile. "He had a knife hidden in his pocket," he said in a childlike voice, smirking.

Blinking, Shinohara glanced at him again. "Really?"

Receiving nothing but a maddening smile in response, Shinohara dropped the line of questioning- for now. It was damn near impossible to get anything out of Juuzou when he was like this. Instead they drove for a while without speaking, Juuzou humming quietly to himself, his big red eyes reflected in the car window.

"Just make sure you're ready for the raid tomorrow night," Shinohara eventually murmured as they pulled into a parking space a short walk away from a quiet little restaurant. Visibly perking up at the mention of the CCG's pending operation, Juuzou jumped out of the car and slammed the door shut behind him. Sticking closely to Shinohara's side, he smiled up at his mentor as he skipped alongside him.

…

II

Misaki Kirihara opened her eyes wearily. She couldn't move- even her eyelids felt stiff as she blinked, adjusting to the light. She exhaled heavily, then winced as the movement caused a sharp twinge in her tender shoulder.

A friendly doctor with an impressive beard smiled at her. "You have a visitor, Miss Kirihara."

"Sorry to wake you," a familiar voice apologized; Misaki recognized him from the awkward smile in his voice even before he came into focus.

"Li," she said, before wincing again. Her voice sounded hideous, and her throat felt worse.

"Hey. I… uh, someone told me you were badly hurt during an investigation. I thought I should, you know, bring you these," he said, showing her the colorful bouquet he was cradling in his arms. It wasn't much, but Misaki was touched by the gesture, if a little bewildered.

"You didn't have to-"

"I wanted to," Li replied bluntly before she had even finished speaking.

"Thank you," she croaked, flashing him a brief smile.

"I'll be just along here if you need anything," the doctor said; having forgotten he was there, Misaki jumped slightly as he nodded politely at them and made his way out of the room.

For what seemed like a very long time neither of them said anything.

"So, how are you?" Li eventually asked, before flushing bright red. "Ah. Sorry. That's kind of a stupid question."

"Don't worry," she laughed, but her heart wasn't in it.

It was certainly very sweet of Li to bring her flowers, and she had to admit that him coming to visit her made her feel more than a little pleased, but how could he have known she'd been hurt? Perhaps he'd come looking for her, had asked about her for whatever reason, and someone in the department had told him what had happened.

That had to have been it.

But of course she knew that wasn't it at all.

Even the sight of him looking sheepishly at her, endearingly self-conscious, blushing as he avoided her eyes, brought back flashing images of the cold indifferent Black Reaper leaning over her as she lay dying. That masked face flickered beneath her eyelids whenever she closed her eyes.

When Saitou had found her bleeding out in the alley- God knows how he had located her in that labyrinth- she'd tried to ask him where BK-201 was, but it was like trying to speak underwater. She'd given up and let herself slip under again, let the questions sink into the depths of her subconscious, but seeing Li here, now, made all her doubts and uncertainties even more urgent. The connection was too obvious too ignore; but what proof did she have?

And besides, what would she do if she _was_ right?

She looked over at Li, _really_ looked; she studied his face, his earnest, if uncomfortable smile, and his body language, his casual yet guarded slouch, the way he hung onto every word she said. There was no way it was all an act, surely.

And yet his eyes, she noticed- and not for the first time- were empty.

…

Hei had no idea what had driven him to visit her. It was ridiculously stupid, he knew, and he was putting himself at unnecessary risk, but he hadn't been able to stop himself.

Of course he had noticed. Of course Hei had noticed how she was growing more suspicious of Li every time they met. He had noticed and yet he couldn't bring himself to distance himself from her. It was almost as if he wanted her to find out. Part of him ached to see her come to the undisputable realization that the killer she'd been obsessing over for so long had been right under her nose for so long; the other part of him- the part he tried to ignore most of the time- needed someone to know him for who he truly was, to know intimately the different parts that made up his personality. He wanted to be understood, he supposed.

He didn't want to be thrown in prison, or shot, though.

Which meant no grand confessions or dramatic unveilings.

Sometimes Hei had to remind himself that he was a contractor, that he didn't feel emotions, that he didn't need to be understood by anyone except himself and the organization he worked for.

And so he left the flowers, smiled impassively at Kirihara, and left with nothing but a brief "well, glad you're feeling better."

III

"I think I should go back."

They were sat in the park, as usual, and it was raining gently. Soft droplets decorated the concrete, and the sun streamed lazily through drooping clouds, catching the falling rain in its rays.

Even though he was facing the opposite direction, Hei heard Huang spluttering on his cigarette smoke. " _Go back?"_ he wheezed. "Why the hell would y-"

"Think about it," Mao interrupted, jumping down from the climbing frame and yawning. His fur was slick with rainwater. "It's the only way to find out about the man who had the memory stick."

" _Just a ghoul_ ," Hei murmured. "He knew about the Syndicate, somehow," he explained quietly, sensing the others' confusion, "or at least, that's what it seemed like. He told me he was 'just a ghoul'."

"A ghoul? What does that mean?" Huang barked.

"Maybe it's some kind of organization," Mao suggested. He curled up under the bench they were sat around, using Hei's ankles as a barrier between himself and the rain. "Was he a contractor?"

"I don't think so." But he didn't seem human, either, thought Hei.

Huang sighed. "Well, if you insist on going back to that bar, bring Mao with you at least."

"What?" Mao protested. Hei shifted his legs; the cat's wet fur was making his ankles uncomfortably damp.

"I will go with you, Hei."

Everyone started slightly at Yin's silvery voice. She hadn't said a word up until that point, and had sat staring dully into the middle distance- Hei hadn't even known she'd been listening- but now she stood up, her brow ever so slightly furrowed.

Huang was spluttering again. "What? Why? Nobody told you to…"

"Let her," Hei interrupted. "She could be useful." He stood, rubbing the moist bottoms of his jeans forlornly. He started to stalk off, Yin floating silently to his side. "Anyway," he added, without looking behind him, "I'll be grateful for the company."

Huang shook his head in disbelief, before scowling as the wet cat coiled around his feet.

…

The bar was less busy than it had been before. Small pockets of people were chattering loudly, as if preparing for something, and nothing was still. The atmosphere was scorching like an electrical fire; the air seemed to buzz with energy.

Yin was sat in a corner, quietly waiting for Hei. He had entered with her at his arm, before seeming to notice something at the bar- she didn't know what- and leaving her at the table she was now sitting at, promising he wouldn't be long. It had been about five minutes now.

She wasn't concerned about him. Yin didn't know if she even had the capacity to feel concern, but even so, she knew Hei could look after himself. However, she was uncomfortable being left alone: it was too noisy, and something big seemed to be happening that everyone was talking about tirelessly.

The thing Hei had noticed was a note, quite obviously intended for him. It read 'knew you'd come back', with 'meet me outside' scrawled on the reverse side. It had just been sitting there on the bar when Hei had walked in. He had no idea how long it'd been there, but it didn't seem as if anyone else had noticed it at all. He'd guided Yin to a booth relatively secluded from anyone else before hurrying outside, clad in his black coat and filled with an inflated sense of confidence knowing that this time he had his weapons with him. This time he had an advantage.

It was still raining, harder now. The rain was invisible in the darkening sky, glancing off of the black road and off of Hei's shoulders, callous and cold. The street was illuminated by streetlights and the dancing headlights of cars, and shadows swiveled and swelled in the unsteady luminosity. Silhoutted against the patchwork of buildings and lights was the unimpressive form of the bar itself; against it leaned the man Hei was looking for. The end of his cigarette glowed menacingly.

"Why'd you come back?"

"You tell me."

The man looked up. He laughed humorlessly. "You think you know secrets?" It was an accusation.

Hei stared. "I don't claim to know anything," he said truthfully.

"You don't know half of it." The man inhaled deeply before dropping his cigarette to the floor and stamping it out with a heavy brown boot, smothering the malicious orange glow.

Hei waited in silence as the man exhaled and a cloud of smoke drifted into the night like some kind of apparition.

The man froze suddenly, his face seizing, his eyes hardening. "You should go."

"What?"

"Doves," he said.

Keeping his stony expression, Hei's eyes scanned his surroundings; once his gaze had settled, the man had vanished. Hei wasn't all too surprised.

 _Doves?_


	4. You Again

_Doves?_

Hei stiffened. He sensed people steadily surrounding the building; he was about to disappear around the corner into the night just like the creepy informant had when, with a twang of guilt, he realised he'd left Yin inside. Glancing around at the people swarming the building, he slipped inside, puzzling over what he had glimpsed. Some sort of government agency? There were about twenty of them, all dressed similarly in long white coats and carrying briefcases. They were decorated with strange emblems, and though Hei hadn't managed to get a good look, he was certain it was nothing he'd seen before.

There was definitely a sense of panic inside the stuffy dive bar. People were jostling and shouting over each other; amidst the chaos, sat silently like a sliver of moonlight, was Yin, looking vaguely uncomfortable. This was, Hei thought, quite a display of emotion for the usually inexpressive doll.

"Yin!" he called out urgently, forcing his way through the patrons. She reached for him with her small white hand as she recognised his voice; before he could get to her, however, the white-coated strangers burst into the bar and immediately noise and violence erupted all around him.

Hei ducked behind the bar as the sudden, unexplainable conflict broke out. Barely a foot to his left, someone was thrown into a shelf of spirits, and shattered glass exploded outwards- a shard caught Hei on the cheek, and he flinched. He lost focus entirely on the cut on his face, however, when his gaze fell on the person lying amidst the jagged glass bottles and pooling alcohol. He'd expected to see a scratched, bloodied mess, but found instead a creature, with eyes of the darkest red, looking unperturbed as it rose and shook off the fragments of glass. As it- or she, as it was clearly female (but not so identifiably _human)_ \- stood, Hei failed to comprehend its form: she seemed to have a broad, solid writhing tail maybe two feet in length and starkly red in colour, which she brandished like a weapon as she launched back into into the fight.

Hei, however, didn't have time to think about it; he scrambled up and scanned the room for Yin; she was still stood in the corner, backed up against a wall and watching silently with wide-eyed confusion. He made a dash for her, narrowly escaping the swing of what seemed to be a briefcase, which then transformed into an elaborate weapon almost like a bladed whip. Whatever these people were, they couldn't have been humans, or even contractors.

He stepped out from behind the bar and was immediately confronted with another red-eyed creature, this one a burly male. Hei had his blade and his wires, and of course his ability, but he wasn't entirely sure even that would be enough to take on these unfamiliar monsters, and so he ducked agilely out of the way and tumbled onto the floor, before springing back onto his feet. Someone was shoved into him and Hei was sent crashing into a table, which he plunged gracelessly over and carried on through; eventually he was close enough to grab onto Yin's hand and they fled through the back door and into the smoking area, sheltered by a set of damp stone steps stretching onto the roof, the gate leading to which was padlocked tightly shut. Hei noticed this in the fraction of a second before before he noticed that there was a handful of the white-coated 'doves' attentively guarding the exit with their strange weaponised briefcases. There would be no way through without some kind of pursuit, he realised, despite knowing they had nothing whatsoever to do with this particular battle. Thinking quickly, Hei grabbed tight onto Yin's arm and reflexively went for his wires. The doves noticed him and Yin just a moment before they disappeared into the night; Hei hadn't had time to secure everything as perfectly as he usually did, and they landed roughly on the flat asphalt roof.

"Hei," Yin whispered, seeming somewhat frightened, though as usual she didn't seem quite as concerned as she possibly should have been. "They aren't contractors," she said quietly.

"I know," Hei replied. He searched the roof for any indication as to what their next course of action should be. Before he could come up with anything, Yin stiffened in his arms, her eyes widening in alarm as she turned to point statue-like towards the stairs.

...

"Suzuya!" Shinohara yelled. "Don't... run off again..." he trailed off and sighed as he watched Juuzou charge up the steps to the roof. There had been a fleeting, barely distinguishable shape that had flown up there just seconds ago, but the investigators watching the exit had more pressing more issues as a fairly high-rated ghoul had begun an increasingly difficult fight, requiring the attention of all four of them, both to subdue the ghoul and to make sure no-one attempted to flee out the back door. Of course, instead of staying to help, Juuzou had pursued the brief flash of black onto the roof, alone.

Juuzou clambered over the padlocked gate and onto the asphalt, quinque in hand. He was certain that in the second he'd glimpsed the two people who had swung onto the roof, he'd recognised one of them as the man from the _other_ roof, that time he had been sat at the top of that old hotel. Seeing the man now, stood there clutching a slender girl with silvery hair by the arm, his suspicions had been affirmed; however, he was pretty sure the man wasn't a ghoul. Juuzou wondered why he was here if he wasn't a ghoul.

"Hei," came the wispy voice of the girl with the silver hair, and they both turned to look at Juuzou.

"You?" Hei asked, recognising the boy almost instantly.

Juuzou was about to say something to them when he sensed someone approaching him on the stairs.

"Behind you," the girl informed him calmly.

Swinging round and taking out the approaching ghoul with his _Jason_ in one clean swipe , Juuzou watched as the ghoul's top half fell from the rest of its body before it even had a chance to realise what had happened. He hit again (just making sure it was definitely dead, he thought) and then another time (just in case) and then just once more, until he was all but drenched in its blood.

"I think he's dead," Hei pointed out dryly. He remembered the boy from that time up on the roof, and was surprised to see him entangled in this mess.

"I know you," Juuzou said, turning away from the brutalised ghoul corpse. "Your name is Li something." He stepped lightly across the roof towards Hei and Yin, trailing his quinque on the asphalt behind him.

"What is happening here? What was that thing you just killed?"

Juuzou stared. "A ghoul, of course. We're raiding this place for them. I only came because I like killing them. I'm good at it!" he said with a smile.

"I can see that you are," Hei replied, glancing towards the several unrecognisable pieces of body strewn across the top few stairs. "What is a... ghoul?"

"I thought you were a ghoul," Juuzou continued, not seeming to care about answering Hei's question, "but now I don't think that you-"

"Watch out, Hei!" Yin suddenly gasped.

Hei turned as he heard the thud of another 'ghoul' landing on the roof behind him. It snarled, its eyes black with crimson irises and pulsing red veins like cracks filled with blood where the whites should have been. Instead of a tail, this one had what appeared to be wings protruding from its back, flickering like strange unearthly flames around its shoulder blades. Instinctively, Hei reached for it and grabbed, letting the electricity course through him and into the creature. The familiar crackle of the hot white energy through his fingers was enough to send the ghoul toppling back off of the roof, where it landed with a crunch on the concrete below. It might have gotten up again, Hei wasn't sure, but his powerful display was enough to keep it from returning back to the roof.

"How did you _do that?"_ the boy- Juuzou- exclaimed excitedly, and Hei was reminded that while Juuzou was somehow involved in this unexplainable fight between this mysterious agency and these even more unexplainable monsters, he had no reason to be aware of the existence of the world of contractors and dolls and the Syndicate. Perhaps, Hei thought, there was more than one kind of hidden underworld to Tokyo, that even he had no idea about. The thought sent a chill down his spine.

"I'll tell you, if you tell me what a ghoul is. And who the people fighting them are," Hei proposed uncertainly.

"Investigator Suzuya, get down here!" someone hollered from down by the back door, and Juuzou frowned.

"I think they need me," he said, sighing petulantly. "I'll get in trouble again if I don't go."

"Wait!"

Hei blinked hard in surprise as Yin detached herself from his arm and cried out softly, reaching for the boy.

Juuzou looked at the girl, tilting his head as he looked into her pale, unseeing eyes. "What's your name?"

Yin didn't reply. Hei stared at her, wondering what she wanted. She'd been starting to act strangely lately, he'd noticed, but he'd thought very little of it. Of course, she wasn't exactly like other Dolls- she'd always been a little different.

Hei was distracted as a familiar scene unfolded in front of him: the same man who'd been with Juuzou that time atop the abandoned hotel was heading up the stairs, this time wearing- to Hei's surprise- one of the long white trench coats, spattered with blood and slightly torn.

Yukinori Shinohara glanced down at the butchered ghoul littered over the steps and frowned. He looked back up and jumped slightly as he noticed Hei stood defensively in his black coat, carabiner-ended wires coiled at his feet, and Yin poised with her delicate fingers reaching for Juuzou, her brows furrowed ever-so-slightly.

"You?" Shinohara exclaimed.

...

"Don't just run off on your own, Juuzou. Working as part of a team is an important skill to learn as an investigator, you know."

Shinohara was sat on a hospital bed, having just had a relatively small injury on his leg patched up; Juuzou was sat against the wall, carefully unpicking stiches in his hand. Shinohara winced as he glanced over at him. He understood that the body stitching was just a way for Juuzou to express himself without hurting himself, but it was still uncomfortable to watch.

He coughed. "It was strange, seeing that same guy on the roof again, wasn't it?"

"I thought he might have been a ghoul and so I followed him," Juuzou replied.

"And you're sure he wasn't? Who was the girl he was with?"

"He wasn't a ghoul, but..." Juuzou frowned, still concentrating on undoing the elaborate patterns cross-stitched on the back of his hand. "There was a ghoul there, and he electrocuted it."

"What? How?" Shinohara thought back to the roof, trying to remember if there had been any means of electricity up there at all. His memory was blurry as he had been tired out from the fighting, and his leg had been sore; he remembered the two of them- the one who had called himself Li and the girl- had disappeared off the side of the building and into the darkness as soon as they caught sight of him, and he remembered the battle in the Helter Skelter ending not long after that. It had been mostly a success, with a few ghouls that had been previously noted as dangerous either killed or sent to Cochlea, and no investigators had been killed. However, after catching sight of the man on the roof once again, Shinohara had been convinced there was something else going on, something they were missing. He hadn't spoken to anyone (except Juuzou, obviously) as he wasn't at all sure what he thought might be going on, but he had a feeling something wasn't quite right.

"He just touched its arm," Juuzou said, answering Shinohara's question as if he was excited to tell him about it, "and then there was all this electricity, and the ghoul fell off the roof!"

"That's... impossible..." Shinohara murmured, before shaking his head. "I don't know. You must have imagined it or something. But Juuzou, the most important thing is that you stick with the squad! If you run off like that again, they won't let you come anymore. In fact..."

Juuzou stopped paying attention, having decided he didn't feel like listening to anymore lecturing. He'd heard it from Marude and some other important investigators he didn't like ever since the raid at the Helter Skelter, and by this point had entirely lost what little interest he'd had in being talked at. Instead he focused on his stitching and let his mind wander. The man on the roof, he remembered, had introduced himself as Li something, but the girl with the strange eyes had been calling him Hei. And no matter what anyone said, he used nothing but his hand to electrocute a ghoul, causing it enough damage that it had fallen off of the roof. So while he definitely hadn't been a ghoul, Juuzou wondered if he was human, and if not what other kind of thing he might be.

Maybe there was more to it than just ghouls and humans, he thought.

Maybe there was something entirely different out there that nobody, not even the CCG, knew about. The thought of it sent a weird feeling down his spine, and he looked up through the window and at the sprawling city outside with wide, wondering eyes.


End file.
